Forever
by FemaleSpock
Summary: It was the two of them caught up in their claustrophobic struggle, none of it meaning anything to anyone besides the two of them. Aarch/Artegor, slash.


Forever

**Disclaimer:**** I do not own Galactik Football and I make no money from this fanfiction.**

**Not sure what happens in Season 3 beyond what's in English, so this is my personal canon; Artegor went back to coach the Shadows after he and Aarch fell out again, Aarch then sunk further into depression/mid-life crisis.**

A loud, and constant banging at the door, woke Aarch from his hangover-induced haze with a start. Dragging himself up, he moved sluggishly from his bed towards the door, running his fingers through his messy hair and wiping the bleariness from his eyes. He only hoped that he didn't look as awful as he felt, in truth, he was in no state to be entertaining visitors. He hadn't even thought about who might be coming to see him at such a time.

Opening the door, he found himself confronted with Artegor, someone who ranked pretty highly on his mental list of people he didn't want to see today.

"Yes?" he said, vaguely. Artegor didn't visit without reason.

"Rocket called me, he's concerned about you," Artegor stated, as bluntly as ever. Rocket must have been getting desperate if he called Artegor; the last time he'd asked him to intervene it hadn't gone so well.

"Do you always do what Rocket tells you?"

"No, now let me in," he said, authoritatively- a tone that Aarch always resented whenever Artegor used it with him.

"No, I'm busy."

"Busy doing what exactly?"

"I'm just busy, bye," he said, shutting the door, finally. It was rude but he had a hangover and he was sick of Artegor's meddling.

Later, when he'd managed to sober up a bit, he went down to the hotel buffet and was confronted with Artegor sitting there calmly eating a bowl of pasta. He shook his head at Artegor's persistence, to which responded with a raise of the eyebrows as if to say 'what did you expect?'

Quickly he grabbed a plate of food, stuffed it down his throat, and bolted back up his room before Artegor could have the chance to speak to him again.

It was later that night when he received another knock on the door.

"Why have you come back here?" Aarch asked, wearily, it being more than a general question than it initially seemed- he just didn't understand why Artegor just kept coming back to him no matter what happened between them.

"You need help," Artegor replied, pushing past him into the room, shutting the door behind him.

"I don't need help from you."

"Who then? It's always come back to being you and me."

"I'm not even the same man I was when I met you," he murmured, barely aware that he was speaking at all.

"You've just lost your way; you always were the 'man with a plan'"

"I wasn't, it was the blind leading the blind, and look how well that turned out," Aarch said, referring to the decision to join the Shadows, how he'd suggested it, how Artegor had followed him without reservation. It had seemed so easy but the whole thing had blown up in their faces- the damage between them could never be completely erased but the thought that it could kept bringing them back together.

Artegor wrung his hands in frustration, this wasn't going anywhere, but then they'd been entrenched like this for years, so what could he expect? Futilely, he reached out for Aarch's shoulder's, shaking them in an attempt to knock some sense into him.

Aarch pushed Artegor's arm away, striking him across the face, knocking the infamous sunglasses off Artegor's nose and onto the floor, where they landed with a clang.

Artegor glared at Aarch, the exposed pale eyes burning with emotion once again. Snarling, he pushed Aarch up against the wall, his face so close to Aarch's that their lips were just about touching in some limp facsimile of a kiss.

"I hate you," he spat, not moving any further away so that Aarch could taste the words against his lips.

Artegor's fury had a strange effect on Aarch; he could feel himself calming down, this felt so much familiar than having Artegor lecture him about where he was going wrong.

"No, you don't," he said, the words taking over again, sounding distanced all of a sudden. He didn't really believe what Artegor was saying, it had all become a matter of habit, a ritualised dance rather than a fight. He knows all the steps, his next move was all laid out for him, he pulled Artegor's head slightly forward turning their stalemate into a real kiss, a furious kiss. For first time in years he felt young again, he felt like he was back on the Shadows and they were holed up in that stuffy little room again, just the two of them, distracting themselves from the deadening pulse of the Smog with something searingly intense. It was the two of them caught up in their claustrophobic struggle, none of it meaning anything to anyone besides the two of them.

Artegor tried to speak again but Aarch wouldn't allow him, wouldn't allow him to ruin what they had with words as flimsy as paper. Aarch's mere presence had often been enough to silence Artegor in the past, back when he had been shy rather than standoffish.

Aarch reached out with his hand, caressing Artegor's cheek, feeling him shudder against it with how much he needed this. The feelings of powerlessness that he had been wallowing were starting to ebb away, replaced with the knowledge that even after all this time he has power over Artegor, the power to draw him like a moth to a flame. Part of the reason he ran away was because he knew Artegor would always come to find him, whether in the guise of friend or nemesis.

"This has to stop."

It's the truth but it's also the truth that it's never going to stop, it's like they jumped off a cliff into a bottomless pit and now there's nothing to do but fall.

Forever.

**That's it for this fic! I feel like I haven't written pure Aarch/Artegor in ages so it felt good to write some again. Review please!**


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